Hi Nicole, you have gone through this twice unlike most here. Your H came back before and left again so its a reopened wound for you will take time to heal. Just put your Ds and your own needs at the top of the list right now, especially with your H just taking off as and when he sees fit you should be least accommodating of him. It takes a great deal of courage to stand up to your M and be a single mom. Hope your D is well adjusted to the new place.
This is a good point. Nicole, is it safe to say that after the first time you guys didn't deal with the root causes properly? I also am in my second go around. As I've documented in my threads, my wife had an online EA with a guy that lived about 45 minutes away from us in 2005. While we stayed together (she was insistent that she wanted to save the MR from the minute I confronted her), we didn't work on the root causes. Thus we found ourselves in the same position (with a few differences) just over 12 years later.
This time she was insistent that she wanted a D. Slowly she backed down from that, but this time we are doing the work to truly fix the root causes through counseling.
I implore anyone reading this going through this for the first time, if you move to R DO NOT SETTLE BACK INTO BUSINESS AS USUAL. Work to improve the new MR, and make sure it doesn't happen again in a few years.
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
Hi Nicole, I just caught up on your situation. I agree with the person that said acceptance is a journey. It truly is and I'm still journeying along as well, ha. I do hope that your H continues to recognize how his actions and absences affect your D and becomes a more attentive father to her. You mentioned your health hasn't been all that good, may I ask what is wrong?
M: 43, H: 44 Married 18 yrs, Together 26 yrs S17, D15, D8, S6 Still living in MH
Thanks again everyone for more great supportive comments and remarks. I will still respond to each one. I've been sick and got further behind on everything. Helena, the main health problem I have is called chronic erosive gastritis but in the past few weeks I've simply had several cold viruses, allergies, and now, thanks to my daughter, pink eye.
A quick update - not really any changes. When my husband visited last week he spent almost no time with our daughter. He was with his family most of the time. My normal reaction would be to complain and make him feel guilty. I really wanted to do that, but I stayed silent. As it turns out, he regretted his actions on his own and called that night saying he will be back in 10 days to spend more time with her and that he shouldn't have done that. He also said he wants to start doing FaceTime with her every day, although so far he's only achieved about 50% of days. He also didn't come back in 10 days but it'll be two weeks of absence when he arrives back this Sunday.
I have to admit that two things made me happy and laugh regarding my husband recently. The other week our daughter told him we were visiting "mommy's friend" that night and when she said the name it sounded like "Donny." My husband asked "Who's Donny!?" And she just said "mommy's friend." Then he asked again a minute later, "who's Donny?" My daughter didn't answer and I didn't make any effort towards telling him it's a female friend of mine. A short time later he called and I told him we're busy and I'll call later. Then a few minutes later he texted and said it's urgent. So I called him back and it was a question about insurance. Something about the timing of those two calls after learning we're visiting "Donny" seemed suspicious. Something similar happened again where my daughter told him we're going to "my school" and he thought she said "Michael." And he said "Who's Michael!?" So clearly he was alarmed at the thought of me taking my daughter to visit a man friend even though that never happened. It was funny though.
I haven't communicated much with my husband otherwise but tonight he was on FaceTime with our daughter and asked something and heard that I was sick. I told him I already saw a doctor and got a prescription and he said "you should have called me, I would have sent a prescription for you." That's a surprise because a few months ago he could have cared less about anything happening with me.
Final note is that my husband has called at various times, and my daughter has called him back at various times, and he always seems to be alone wherever he is, even later at night. I'm guessing things didn't work out so well with his 26 year old girlfriend or he's keeping it casual. Hopefully being alone in our old city while all the 'action' is happening up here with us and his family and friends in our Northern city is making him think twice about everything.
There's no indication that my husband wants to fix our marriage, although with each passing week there's still no new mention of divorce, so I don't know what to think. For now I'm leaving everything as-it-is. My husband is sending all of the money I requested each month and has offered to send more.
I'm not too hopeful that my husband will try to fix our marriage because while there's been no new mention of divorce, there's been no apology or mention of reconciling either. I know most of you have recommended that I not consider him again in the future but honestly everything would depend on the circumstances. I'll comment more in another post ASAP and look forward to responding to each of your posts. Thanks again.
As you know, I've been following your posts from the beginning, and when he said what he said about your daughter, I jumped on the "never let him back" bandwagon. I still don't trust him, but I will give him credit for appearing to do SOME things right by her. At least he is still in contact, however sporadic, and even if you can't count on him to come back in 10 days like he said he would.
I think it's great that he misunderstood about the two guys, and suspect he's thinking "wtf????? She's supposed to be heartbroken! How can she possibly be hanging out with him?" Don't disabuse him of this notion. Even if it's in error, it's good for him to think you are not pining away for his return. I still don't think he deserves you, though.
Good on you for not making him feel guilty. I suspect he's rethinking things. But please please please if he's rethinking things, make sure he does the hard work first.
M:23 T:26 Me:53, Wife: 60 S:18 D:16 filed 7/16 W moved out 4/28/17
Hi Nicole, I understand you wanting to find a glimmer of hope in any given scenario. Your H not mentioning D is a positive, but he is not even remotely close to the H you deserve or a father your daughter ought to have. He needs to prove himself to you a thousand times over for what he has done so far. Keep strong. Hugs to both you and your D.
Hi Nicole, I understand you wanting to find a glimmer of hope in any given scenario. Your H not mentioning D is a positive, but he is not even remotely close to the H you deserve or a father your daughter ought to have. He needs to prove himself to you a thousand times over for what he has done so far. Keep strong. Hugs to both you and your D.
This is good advice. And it something that I look back at my sitch and wonder if I set enough requirements for R or not. As LBSs we sometimes are too eager to R without our S doing what they need to do, and it means we risk being right back in the same sitch in the future.
Nicole, don't make it effortless for him to return to the MR.
M(53), W(54),D(19) M-23, T-25 Bomb Drop - Dec.23, 2017 Ring and Piecing since March 2018
I wish I could have responded sooner. I've been sick and kept getting worse and worse and finally got on antibiotics yesterday and feel slightly better. Let me start by responding to the most recent comments from the most recent update and then I'll create another post with responses to older comments.
Jim, there are no literal signs that my husband is re-thinking things. I think he's recognized some of his shortcomings as a father and he's also less angry at me, but there are no signs he wants to fix our marriage. He's flying to our city tonight, staying with his family again, and he'll come to visit our daughter tomorrow. He wanted to fix the marriage I'd expect him to ask if he can stay with us, his own family, rather than his parents and brothers. But no, he would rather be with them. Perhaps he has a girlfriend and he promised her he'll stay with them although it doesn't appear to be the 26 year old nurse any longer.
Vanilla, to be fair, my husband calls our daughter every day but only manages to initiate FaceTime every two or three days. His track record of visiting since we've moved here seems to be every 14 days. So he talks to our daughter every day and see's her about every two weeks. I think you may have mis-read the numbers on calls vs. visiting. I really don't know if what he's doing is an improvement or not. Most of my thoughts about him as a father are related to how much of a failure he is, but it seems he's trying to tell himself he's a good dad if he calls every day for a few minutes and visits every few weeks. That doesn't seem sufficient to me.
Arsh, yes sure my husband may have back off the immediate divorce he wanted but he's done nothing to fix the marriage. His slight efforts to communicate with our daughter make him one step above the worst-of-the-worst. My updates are mainly focused on how the crisis we were going through has died down, but sadly it hasn't resulted in any change of heart from my husband.
Steve, unfortunately this has been going on with my husband for years and he left two-and-a-half years ago for eight weeks. He returned and I allowed it to be effortless. Unfortunately I was so heartbroken that I was too happy when he returned to make it difficult. He also came in tears one night, saying he's depressed, wanted to kill himself, was so sorry, etc.. I think one reason why I took him back as easily as I did is because I didn't have many details about his affair. Only later did I accidently find details on an Ipad he gave our daughter still logged into his account. I also found out later that he wasn't staying with his brother as he had said but he had rented his own bachelor pad in Manhattan. Then I was really upset but he kept stringing me along promising to fix everything with he finished his residency, finished his board exams, finished his first few weeks of work, etc.. I wrote about all that earlier so don't want to bore anyone but now I've learned my lesson and I know I can't take him back easily, if at all. But it's not something I need to be concerned about because he's been gone for nine months this time with still no sign of being sorry or wanting to return. If he wants to return in the future it will depend on many things, particularly whether he's received professional help and made verifiable changes to his life. He'd also have to be willing to be transparent again. There would be a long list of things before we could try again, but I've lost hope that will happen. He's long gone now. Perhaps he'll process the divorce when he moves to our state next year or maybe he's fine with staying separated indefinitely since that requires the least amount of effort. Who knows. I wish I had done the right thing when he wanted to return the first time.
Bluesun, I look forward to reading your story when you can post it. It's good you've learned the lesson of patience.
Caz, I'm so glad to hear you've had success with detaching! It's also good to know your daughter stood up for you and herself. I wonder if your husband will ever wake up? It's good you're no longer waiting for that to happen. Will you continue to stay married but separated?
Maika, I'm still trying to survive and stabilize my life. There are no potential new men in my life but if, in a year, the perfect guy comes along then first I wouldn't believe he's so perfect (because now I've learned that lesson when I thought my husband was perfect) then perhaps over time I might start to see such a man as a potential partner. It's all theoretical though because there hasn't been any other man in my life that I've loved like my husband. I have a very limited dating history (meaning only one person before my husband) and I have little interest in dating for religious reasons and being too conservative. I know I'm limiting myself in that regard but I grew up that way and just can't seem to change this mindset. I can't imagine sleeping with various men (or any man) like the few divorced colleagues I have say they've done and I also can't imagine marrying a guy without knowing him like a lot of people do in my husband's home country. I'd almost have to know someone as a friend for an extended period of time to even consider another relationship that could lead to marriage. Right now I have no idea how I'll feel about my husband in another year or two. I think I'll always have hope he'll change because I know he's not the good man I married. This wild streak might run its course but if that takes another ten years then hopefully by that time I'll have met someone else or lost interest in my husband. I'm still just sad that my husband chose to destroy everything we built together and went on a wreckless rampage with no regard for the welfare of my daughter and I. Unless my husband makes big changes to his life he probably will find another girlfriend in the near future, most likely another easy girl in her 20's for fun and entertainment purposes. As for how to influence my husband's behavior as a father - I'm not sure how to do that. I tried for a long time to point out how his actions affected her and his response was always "stop making me feel like sh$t." Nowadays I say nothing. He can show up when it's convenient for him or do nothing at all and I'm just letting him go. Sometimes I send him positive feedback when he does something our daughter likes but I don't know what else to do. If we get divorced then I guess we'll have to discuss custody issues but she's always been 100% with me so I doubt that'll be a problem. There's a lot I'm not sure about right now.
New2nev, I didn't get to read my old messages but I think what I meant about not having anything to offer a new man right is related to lack-of-time. Between caring for my daughter and working multiple consulting jobs I feel I have no time to offer a new man. It takes time and effort to get to know someone. Perhaps when I stabilize my life I'll have the ability to get a babysitter every so often and go out, but even then I'm not interested in having a physical relationship with a man who's not my husband so I couldn't offer that kind of casual fun that some people seek when they're dating. And finally I can't really offer much mental energy to any other man right now because I'm so exhausted from everything. It's not that I don't think I'm worthy or attractive or interesting, I just feel like I'm still barely hanging on and have nothing to offer anyone else right now. I do try to offer encouragement to others and do favors for others though.
Arsh, yes we need to find self worth. I'm not the kind of person who feels the need to focus on myself to feel good because I've lived in many developing countries and observed families in other settings, especially at lower socioeconomic levels, and rarely do the mothers feel the need to focus on themselves. They seem genuinely happy caring for their kinds and seem to accept the work that goes with it. Others who don't have kids seem proud of their careers and extended families. It's somewhat of a cultural idea to focus on ourselves. I struggle with it. For now I'd be more than happy if I could muster up more energy to focus on faith. Things like clothing, shopping, spa days, etc.. don't really interest me although I recognize the need to look as good as possible. I exercise and have hobbies into which I try to incorporate my daughter, but I'd be doing all those things with or without my husband around. I've always lived a healthy lifestyle. For me it's more helpful trying to focus on balancing everything than 'on myself' but I know I'm missing the point in the context of DB. Our children do make everything worthwhile though because their unconditional love is an example of how we should all be every day!
Max123, how long do you think you and your husband will continue to live separately but stay married? This is something I question about my own current arrangement.
Davide, thanks for your encouragement! Yes I've tried to find strength even when I'm tired and deepened relationships with other friends in place of my husband. I look forward to reading more of your thread to learn how you're coping.
Arsh, being a single mom is really, really hard, especially when you and your kid are both sick at the same time and there's no one to help. It makes you understand the value of having a partner - someone who helps when you need help and who you help when they need help. Without a partner it literally comes down to a struggle to survive. If I had parents or siblings who could help then I'd probably be much, much more resilient. Do you have any family helping you currently?
Jim, thanks for your thoughts! I look forward to your next updates on your wife and divorce process.
One more update: My husband is here visiting today. He asked if we can go to a place that our daughter likes that's three hours away. He said we can stay in a hotel there. I told him nicely I can't go due to my work and being ill. Kind of like Jim's wife inviting herself to the movies - they want divorce and freedom yet they have no issue spending time with us when it's convenient for them I suppose.
